


Through Thick and Thin

by kikibug13



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Gen, Short One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-05
Updated: 2015-08-05
Packaged: 2018-04-13 03:00:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,062
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4505121
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kikibug13/pseuds/kikibug13
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I have known the thief for ages<br/>Tracked him down through thick and thin"</p>
<p>One of those chases.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Through Thick and Thin

**Author's Note:**

  * For [evocates](https://archiveofourown.org/users/evocates/gifts).



> This is a silly fic inspired by a bit in Alfie Boe's wiki information on how he set on the path of a singer/actor. Alas, there's only so much fluff even this situation can yield, with Javert and Valjean.

The first time Jean became aware of something out of the ordinary (well, his new ordinary; the one of close-to-twenty years could not be brought into consideration, of course), he was almost halfway through one of the arias that the little girl who sometimes hung around the garage, poking her nose and asking about everything and everything, really liked. Three of the mechanics were clustered under the hood of a car, and as he took a breath, moving around the car he was buffing up, he could see them look at something in the outer part of the garage, the one open to customers, and nudging each other. 

He thought nothing of it.

The next time, the manager tossed over her shoulder as she passed around him, when he'd just finished, "you've got a fan, Pierre. Since he comes about pretty regularly to listen to you sing, no complaints from me."

He shrugged, hummed a little as he tried to buff out a scratch... and in a couple of minutes he was singing again, the large space echoing with his voice around the occasional growl of a drill or spark of a welder. 

He was happy with his job, here. He'd had to beg - and use his strength for a favor or two - to get fake documents, but he could keep a proper job to _learn_ how a good business worked, before setting up his own. The silver was mostly untouched; he had plans for that, plans that would turn the man who'd been left behind in something entirely different. For now, he was working. As honestly as he could, as Pierre Vert. His efforts were appreciated, his coworkers were decent people, or decent enough, if a little rough around the edges.

He was happy. 

So he sang. Something he hadn't thought to do for nearly two decades, at Toulon. The mechanics had teased him a bit over his choice of music, because a garage seemed a more fitting place to hear a rock riff than opera, but that didn't last too long. Now it was just part of the day, when he was here. 

Apparently, a customer had noticed, and not in a bad way. No reason for him to do anything about it, was there? 

So it went on for a few more weeks, the looks not stopping. It was over their sandwiches one lunch break that somebody muttered that it looked like that particular customer had begun smiling, too, when "Pierre's voice soars to the skies". 

For his age, and with his past, Jean was rather startled to discover that he could, actually, still blush.

*** 

Javert was never one to seek out what others termed 'beautiful.' He'd gone to that particular garage because one of the other policemen had mentioned they did good service. And maybe he'd gone back - to use the wash adjacent - for that man's singing. 

He couldn't exactly afford to have his car tuned up as he suspected the place could do for him. But he came back, as often as he managed. Javert didn't know the music (what music would he have even known?) but it pleased him to just listen to it. Again... and again.

He never asked who it was that did singing, though he was far too keen to miss the fact that the staff at the garage knew exactly why he came back. It didn't matter, so long as he paid for the services he recieved, did it? 

So it went on until the day Javert was made Inspector. That change came with a slight raise, and, on an impulse, he bought a bottle of wine to treat the unknown singer with, besides the crackers and juice he brought for the people he'd been working with to help themselves to in celebration. (Everybody who got a promotion did that. Even if Javert wasn't exactly cordial with anyone, it seemed unnecessarily petty to avoid it.) 

As his luck would have it, the girl at the front desk was the less obnoxious one, so he didn't turn away from his task before he'd even attempted. 

"Excuse me, I... you must know your colleague who sometimes sings so beautifully, don't you?"

"Oh, of course." Her smile widened from the bland, usual one, showing off her dimples.

"Ah... does he happen to be at work, today?" 

"Actually, yes."

"Could you tell me when he has a break, or something of the kind? I got a promotion, and I thought it a proper occasion to at least find out who it is that has been bringing me something unexpected and nice." He was an Inspector, now. His policeman curiosity could be satisfied, could it not? And that was all it was.

"I can go get him just now. He never abuses the break privileges, and it's no trouble to shift the time of the break around a little. You don't have to wait more than necessary..."

A few minutes later saw her walking back out with a man who was shorter than her, even as his broad shoulders suggested he would hardly be somebody to push over. Then the man raised his face from the shy - or embarrassed - smile he was giving his shoes...

A pair of very familiar eyes widened, comically slowly, at the sight of him. Javert's breath caught, and his hand on the throat of the bottle loosened as it dropped back in his bag.

24601 bolted. 

He started back into the garage, slamming the door closed; by the time Javert had managed to open it, his badge held out in explanation, he could just see the back of the man disappearing around the back entrance. 

When Valjean had finally lost him, scaling brick wall with no reach of a fire escape, Javert leaned back against the wall, his breath taken as much by the chase as the knowledge that this was the man who'd brought him, dare he think it? pleasure, for the first time in a very, very long time.

Convict. Criminal. 

A little man, a little beast of such passion...

And such a voice.

At least now Javert could dismiss the whole thing as unworthy of his time. Ignoring the small part of him that was going to miss the twenty-minute snatches of beauty unlike anything else he had known in his life was going to be easy. Wasn't it?


End file.
